| | |  | Puzzles | Home » » Ravensburger The Earth - 540 Piece puzzleball | | | | | | | Description: | | The latest and greatest innovation from Ravensburger, this unique three-dimensional puzzle inspires a world of wonder among both kids and adults. It's specially crafted from sturdy, curved plastic pieces that fit securely in place to form a round, smooth ball. Once completed, proudly display it anywhere using the included sturdy metal V-shaped stand. No glue required. 540 pieces. Measures 8.5" diameter. | | | Features: | |
• Features perfectly crafted, curved puzzle-pieces
• Can be easily assembled together to form a solid, smooth ball
• No glue required
• Includes both a plastic base stand and metal rotation stand
• 540 piece set
| | | Product Details: | | | Product Length:
| 10.4 inches | | Product Width:
| 10.4 inches | | Product Height:
| 3.3 inches | | Product Weight:
| 1.85 pounds | | Package Length:
| 10.5 inches | | Package Width:
| 10.4 inches | | Package Height:
| 3.3 inches | | Package Weight:
| 2.0 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 57 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 57 customer reviews )
Write an online review and share your thoughts with other customers.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
111 of 111 found the following review helpful:
 great puzzleAug 21, 2008
By R. Belikov
I'm not a big fan of jigsaw puzzles (sure, they are fun, but I can think of more fun things to do with my time), but when I saw this thing in its assembled form at barnes and noble, something about it made me do a double take. It just looked so cool and unusual -- a professional-looking globe made out of jigsaw pieces with no internal support! How can it be so smooth? How can it stay solid? I hadn't even noticed that it wasn't a solid globe at first, when casually catching it out of the corner of my eye a few times as I was browsing the book stalls. It seemed like a lot of fun to make something like this, as was the prospect of testing my geography. My wife didn't see it as all *that* cool, but we still had a blast assembling this thing, though she only did the US, canada, and antarctica and only had patience for 30-60 minutes at a time. Trying to figure out which part of the world a given piece belonged to based only on parts of city names was a lot of fun. Watching it grow was great. Highly addictive, causes sleep loss. Took 3 days, maybe 4 hours a day. I would say the difficulty level is appropriate for adults and kids over ~12, or under 12 if accompanied by adults (unless it's assembled in cheat-mode where you look at the numbers on the backs of pieces). The pieces are hard and plastic, and interlock pretty tightly. It holds together pretty well during assembly, and is sturdy when fully assembled -- you can roll it around like a soccer ball (just don't kick it) and it can spin in the base very fast without breaking. It didn't seem quite as smooth as in the store -- some pieces jotted out by a fraction of a mm, but it does look perfectly smooth from a distance. My only qualm is that the printing on some adjacent pieces was slightly misaligned (< 1mm) and that some ocean pieces are completely identical, so that the only way to distinguish them is by the numbers in the back. But it's actually perfectly useable as a regular, fairly detailed globe and especially as a cool decoration! I'll probably eventually get some of their other ones, such as the globe of the night sky.
39 of 39 found the following review helpful:
Excellent product!!Jan 18, 2008
By Debra Damato
My 9-year old daughter and I have had a wonderful experience with this puzzle. She started out using the numbers on the back of the pieces, but I convinced her to use her regular puzzle skills to assemble the globe. We've both learned a thing or two about geography! I chose the Ravensburger brand because of its quality and durability; I wasn't disappointed. I definitely recommend this product to others.
28 of 31 found the following review helpful:
 Difficult or impossible to assemble neatlyJul 12, 2009
By James Frick
"seventies rock fan"
I have purchased two sets of this puzzle globe. I consider myself to have above average skills in modeling and crafts, and I've been assembling puzzles and models for over 40 years. I found it impossible to assemble this puzzle neatly, without flaws. I realized, soon after inspecting the first set I bought, that it would never assemble properly without glue. In certain areas of the puzzle the pieces simply don't fit together properly, without creating distorting stresses in the ball. Some pieces require forcing or trimming to go together at all.
I was not satisfied with the first resulting globe so I decided to get another one and try again. It hasn't gone much better. I assembled the puzzle to the midpoint, the equator, and began to have serious difficulties.
The photo of the completed puzzle on the box can't be an actual, assembled Earth globe puzzle, not one of the mass produced ones, anyway. It is quite deceptive.
If you want a jigsaw puzzle, I recommend one that's made of two dimensional panels, or a smaller size spherical puzzle. This one was quite frustrating.
19 of 21 found the following review helpful:
 Old Guy's toyAug 27, 2008
By Ladene J. Ward
"bookcutie"
We love maps and globes. Our family room is full of them. This is just the latest addition to the decor. It was fun to put together. I'm not sure how kid friendly it is but it is really old guy friendly.
10 of 10 found the following review helpful:
Great puzzle; several flawsDec 27, 2010
By M. Toleno
"Soli Deo gloria"
This was an extremely fun puzzle. I stayed up late at night working on it. If you don't "cheat" by using the numbers on the backs of the pieces, it is an excellent way to learn and review geography. The pieces have a great, smooth feel to them. They feel solid and seem to be waterproof (plastic or plastic-coated). My wife and I had a great deal of fun with the puzzle and would recommend it for most ages down to about age 8, depending on a child's interest in learning and an adult's ability to teach and to interest children in learning. It might be a bit tedious for kids too young or too impatient.
The puzzle is fairly solid and rigid when completed (thanks, probably, to my use of tape on the inside). It spins well in the metal stand. I disagree with the reviewers who faulted the stand--it was easy to use and did not require distorting the puzzle. I also disagree with those who wrote that it cannot be constructed in sections. That's exactly how I did it.
I gave this item 5 stars in the provided categories and would have given it 5 stars overall if not for these flaws:
1. The numbering on the back is great for the ocean areas that have virtually no distinctive features, but can ruin the experience and the learning for the land areas and the oceanic areas that have features. The numbers should only be provided for the featureless oceanic areas.
2. The box and on-line advertisements very clearly state that the puzzle requires no gluing. This is simply false. Many, if not most, connections are not solid enough to stay together well enough to support the weight of other connecting pieces. Some simply fall apart when lightly touched. There is no way this puzzle can be constructed without adhesive. Once I accepted that, and started using tape, I really enjoyed putting it together.
3. The instructions are pretty good, but do not give the full story. They indicate that the puzzle must be constructed in a certain way (South Pole to North Pole), but this does not lend itself to constructing sections, such as continents, and then assembling them, and it is also not the best way to finish the puzzle. Finishing the puzzle effectively took some creative engineering (which was fun for me, but not intended per the instructions).
4. Many, if not most, pieces have discontinuities across their connections--i.e., the words and features printed on the outside do not line up perfectly. It's not terrible, but it doesn't look like a normal puzzle.
5. The picture on the box of the completed puzzle is deceptive. It shows no discontinuities and a perfectly smooth surface. (It's probably a prototype.) Even with creative engineering, very meticulous construction, and liberal use of tape on the inside, my completed puzzle has many connections that are not perfectly smooth. It also has many discontinuities.
6. Many pieces are almost identical in shape and connection points. In other words, it's possible to fit many pieces together that are not supposed to be together. I had a few oceanic sections fitted (and taped) together, only to discover later that they were not in the correct place (by looking at the numbers and after connecting additional sections). A "real" puzzle, even one with significantly more pieces, has very few or zero connections that are identical. You should always be able to tell with 100% certainly whether a connection is correct--even in a featureless area.
In spite of these objections, I recommend this toy, but hope that the manufacturers would improve their products in the future.
See all 57 customer reviews on Amazon.com
| | |
|
